My husband admitted he hates me

Throwaway because I don’t want to be searched for and I also don’t want my regular friends to know. I (40F) have been with my husband (45M) for 17 years. I was engaged for a couple of months before we got married, so I’ve been his wife for basically my entire adulthood.<br><br>I have three kids and he has none, but he always wanted to be a dad so when we got married he became a dad to my kids. This has been a theme in our marriage. I have always supported us both financially. He’s never worked. He had a lot of student loans to pay off for his doctorate, plus he hasn’t been able to find a job in his field despite sending out probably hundreds of resumes. He did try to get into the military but he’s not fit enough and was told his asthma was too severe to be eligible. So basically, he’s a 45 year old man with a doctorate who can’t get a job and who is medically disqualified from the military. That’s fine, everyone has to deal with stuff. I’m more than happy to support him and am happy to do so. The house, bank accounts, everything is in both our names so it’s equal.<br><br>Anyway, I’ve always sensed that he didn’t particularly like me, or respect me, but I’ve never really had any major fights with him. I’ve always thought he just didn’t understand me. I guess I’ve always been a bit of a weirdo. I have very strong opinions on things and I can be a bit much sometimes. But I always tried my best to make him happy, to make sure he has everything he needs, and to make our house a happy home for our kids.<br><br>Recently, he has become really nasty to me. He calls me horrible names, he is physically abusive, he threatens to leave me and take our kids away from me (despite the fact that they are mine, not his, and have always been financially and emotionally supported by me). He accuses me of spending too much money, but I don’t spend much at all. I let him do all our homeschooling so he has no transportation costs, no food costs, no homeschool costs, basically none of these costs exist because he’s at home with the kids. All our bills are paid. We have a joint credit card that we use to buy things for the kids. He spends more than me on that, but I don’t buy much at all. The house is fully furnished and decorated, the yard is maintained, we eat good food. I cook for him every night and he never complains about the food. He has a garden and grows a lot of our own food. He harvests fruit from a nearby tree and brings it home to the kids. He has no bills. He has no expenses. I pay all of the bills and he does not pay anything into the pot.<br><br>I was trying to work things out with him, but he just won’t. He says I’m a piece of shit and he hates me and wishes I was dead. It is really scaring me. I’m scared he might actually kill me. I’m thinking of leaving him, but I’m not sure how I’d manage. I have the kids, so that’s good, and I have a job and money saved up, so I’d be able to survive on my own. But I’m worried he’ll take the kids from me. He has never tried to take them from me before, but he has said recently that he wants to. I don’t know what to do.<br><br>A few days ago, he told me he didn’t even like me and never has. He said he only married me because he wanted to be a family man. I asked him what he liked about me and he said nothing, and that he had never actually liked me in the first place. He said he was just a kid and he wanted a wife and kids and since I had everything anyway he just took it. He said he had no intention of ever loving me or of trying to make me happy and that he thought I was a stupid bitch for expecting that from him. He said he didn’t love our kids and he never wanted to be their father. He said he didn’t mean to lead me on, but he had to have a wife in order to fulfill his desire to be a dad, so he married me but he never intended for me to be his wife. He said he never intended for me to even like him and he didn’t think I was smart enough to figure out what was going on. He said he only married me a few months after we started dating because he realised I wasn’t going to leave me and he wanted to get his feet off the ground so he had to take control. He said he has always thought of me as a servant and that I should refer to him as my lord and master. He said he has never liked me, not even once, and he said he never wanted to love me and he never did. He told me to refer to him as my master and said that I should be happy that he agreed to take me as his wife and that I should thank him for his magnificence. He said he was a god and that I am nothing. He told me I should refer to him as my lord and that I am his property and that he owns me and I should do whatever he says. He said he was disappointed I didn’t leave after he started treating me like shit because he thought I was braver than that. He said he hated that he had wasted his time thinking I was a good wife because he thought I was better than that and would be more proud of myself. He said he didn’t care about me, he never did, and that he wishes I was never born and that he had never met me.<br><br>He said that the reason he’s been treating me the way he has recently is that he realised I’m not going to leave him and he’s angry at me for staying. He said he wanted me to leave so he could be free, but I haven’t left so he’s staying and continuing to treat me the way he has been. I told him that if I stay, I will try to be better to him but he said no, he will not try to be better to me. He said I am a terrible person who doesn’t even deserve to live and that he hates me. He told me that he only agreed to be my husband and my kids’ father because he had to, but he doesn’t have to stay and he is planning to leave me and he said there is nothing I can do to stop him.<br><br>I’ve been trying to get counseling for us, but he refuses to go. I’ve been trying to make an emergency protective order, but he is making it difficult for me to do so because he refuses to vacate the premises when I ask him to and he keeps trying to get in the way of me trying to get an order. I’m not sure what I should do. I want to protect myself and my kids. I’m scared he will kill me. I don’t know what I should do to protect myself. He has all the money and I have none. He has all the power in our marriage and I have none. I don’t know what I should do.<br><br>&#x200B;